Psychology: From Inquiry to Understanding: Chapter 2

Prefrontal Lobotomy

Surgical procedure that severs fibers connecting the frontal lobes of the brain from the underlying thalamus.

Heuristic

Mental shortcut or rule of thumb that helps us to streamline our thinking and make sense of our world.
Represententivness: Heuristic that involves judging the probability of an an event by its superficial similarity to a prototypes
availability: heuristic that involves estimating the likely hood of an occurrence based on the ease that it comes our mind

Naturalistic Observation

Watching behavior in real-world settings without trying to manipulate the situation.

External Validity

Extent to which we can generalize findings to real-world settings.

Internal Validity

Extent to which we can draw cause and effect inferences from a study.

Case Study

Research design that examines one person or a small number of people in depth, often over an extended time period.

Existence Proof

Demonstration that a given psychological phenomenon can occur.

Random Selection

Procedure that ensures every person in a population has an equal chance of being chosen to participate.

Reliability

Consistency of Measurement
inter rater reliability: the extent to which different people who conduct an interview or make behavioral observations agree on the characteristics they are measured

Validity

Extent to which a measure assesses what it purports to measure.

Response Set

Tendency of research participants to distort their responses to questionnaire items.

Correlational Design

Research design that examines the extent to which two variables are associated.
Negative: How we do on our midterm, and how much alcohol you consume
Positive: Depression is positively correlated with fatigue
zero: No correlation

Scatterplot

Grouping of points on a two-dimensional graph in which each dot represents a single person's data.

Illusionary Correlation

Perception of a statistical association between two variables where none exists.

Experiment group

Research design characterized by random assignment of participants to conditions and manipulation.

Control Group

In an experiment, the group of participants that doesn't receive the manipulation.

Independent Variable

Variable that an experimenter manipulates.

Dependent Variable

Variable that an experimenter measures to see whether the manipulation has an effect.

Operational Definition

A working definition of what a researcher is measuring.

Placebo Effect

Improvement resulting from the mere expectation of improvement.

Blind

Unaware of whether one is in the experimental group or control group.

Experimenter Expectancy Effect

Phenomenon in which researchers' hypotheses lead them to unintentionally bias the outcome of a study.

Double-Blind

When neither researchers nor participants are aware of who's in the experimental or control group.

Demand Characteristics

Cues that participants pick up from a study that allow them to generate guesses regarding the researcher's hypothesis.

Informed Consent

Informing research participants of what is involved in a study before asking them to participate.

Statistics

Application of mathematics to describing and analyzing data.

Descriptive Statistics

Numerical characterizations that describe data.

Central Tendency

Measure of the "central" scores in a data set, or where the group tends to cluster.

Mean

Average; a measure of central tendency

Median

Middle score in a data set; a measure of central tendency

Mode

Most frequent score in a data set; a measure of central tendency.

Variability

Measure of how loosely or tightly bunched scores are.

Range

Difference between the highest and lowest scores; a measure of variability.

Standard Deviation

Measure of variability that takes into account how far each data point is from the mean.

Inferential Statistics

Mathematical methods that allow us to determine whether we can generalize findings from our sample to the full population.

base rate

How common a characteristic or behavior is in the general population

cognitive biases

Systematic errors in thinking
Two types
Hindsight: Tendency to overestimate how well we could successfully forecasted known outcomes
over confidence: are tendency to over estimate our ability to make correct predictions

Random assighnment

Randomly sorting participants into groups

experimental group

In an experiment, the group that is exposed to the manipulation, that is, to one version of the independent variable

between subject design

experimental design in which different groups of subjects are exposed to the various levels of the independent variable

within subject design

Each participant acts as his or her own control

Extrasensory perception

Perception of events outside the known channels of sensation

scientific method

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meta-analysis

Allows researchers to seek patterns across larger numbers of studies and draw general conclusions that hold up across different laboratory's .
A key problem is the tendency for negative findings to remain unpublished. file drawer problem

nocebo

Harm resulting from the merer expectation of harm.

hawthorne effect

A change in a subject's behavior caused simply by the awareness of being studied

covert observation

observation in which the observer's presence or purpose is kept secret from those being observed

malingering

Deliberate faking of a physical or psychological disorder motivated by gain

self report measure

survey, a method of gathering data about people by asking them questions about a sample of their behavior. In order for these measure to be accurate certain protocol must be met, must be reliable and validity. A test must be reliable to be valid but a reliable test can be completely invalid
pros: East to administer, answers are direct
cons: accuracy is scewered, potential dishonesty, positive impression, malingering

demand characteristics

Cues that participants pickup from an experiment that allow them to guess what the hypothesis of a study does

practical significance

another term for real world importance

statistical significance

applies that the results are not likely due to chance